In-Class Games Help Students Apply Key Concepts
In my high school science classes I attempt to keep lecture time down per each one hour class. The remainder of the time is spent applying the class concepts to various content related problems. I break students into groups every class for collaborative learning. In an effort to further change things up in the classroom, I introduce games, including Kahoot and Jeopardy.
Kahoot – Kahoot is an online gaming platform that is easy to learn and easy to use in the classroom. It is a very common gaming tool used by teachers in classrooms ranging from elementary school students to college students. Teachers create multiple choice “quizzes” and students answer the questions on their phones/laptops/tablets. Students earn points for answering questions correctly. More points are awarded the more quickly a question is answered. The top five leaders are shown after every question. In my classes, when we play Kahoot, I take time between each question to have students explain the answers. If a question is missed by a majority of the class, I break the class into groups to further discuss the question. Prizes (stickers, science magazines, etc.) are awarded to the top three students. At the end of the quiz, a spreadsheet of all questions results can be downloaded for further analysis.
Jeopardy – Every couple of weeks, for review, I setup a Jeopardy game board with questions based on recent classroom concepts. Students are broken into teams and a scoreboard of “money” earned is kept. Every Jeopardy game we play includes daily doubles as well as a final Jeopardy question in which teams must wager money. Prizes (stickers, science magazines, etc.) are awarded to the winning team.
Challenges or Obstacles:
- Both Kahoot and Jeopardy, as well as all other online-game platforms, require the use of technology to display on a screen, and in many cases, access to the internet.
- For Kahoot, in particular, each student needs access to a device (phone, tablet, laptop) connected to the internet.
- Schools with a very stringent internet filter may run into trouble accessing online game platforms.
- There can be a learning curve for both students and teachers, but often this learning curve is minimal and any problems are figured out after the first time playing.
Benefits and Successes:
- End of semester student evaluations reveal students greatly enjoy the opportunity to learn through games. Several students commented on wanting to play these games more often.
- Games such as Kahoot offer opportunities for collaborative learning if used appropriately. There are many opportunities to take time between Kahoot questions to further discuss or to review a topic before continuing.
- Students are typically competitive and enjoy seeing how the leaderboard changes. This further encourages them to take the games seriously.
- Once each semester I set up an assignment in which students must create a Kahoot quiz. This goes over extremely well with students! The top quizzes are played in class. Knowing quizzes will be played in class, students take great pride in taking the time to create a difficult quiz related to class material. Their goal is often to develop a difficult quiz that stumps their classmates!
Submitted by: Dain Kavars, Indiana Academy for Science, Mathematics, and Humanities